


Prologue

by Ataraxetta



Series: Branded [2]
Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Angst, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mentions of canonical attempted suicide, Minor Character Death, Spoilers, Unresolved Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-08
Updated: 2015-06-08
Packaged: 2018-04-03 11:04:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,998
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4098679
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ataraxetta/pseuds/Ataraxetta
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The mask from Ronan's dream isn't a metaphor, and with the Third Sleeper, it's come awake. Ronan is nowhere near prepared.</p><p>Or, a super fake prologue for book iv. If book iv were, well, all about Ronan.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> This is a complete work: a fake prologue for book 4, and is unresolved the way a prologue would be. 
> 
> Once again it is very Ronan-centric (can you tell I have a favorite? Naturally that means it's time to hurt him as much as possible). It's the other part of the WIP I was able to work into its own thing, so loosely related but not part of my earlier fic. However still based on the same premises: a) the idea of Ronan belonging to Cabeswater as its protector (and also therefore as Adam's), and b) a twisty horror-esque what-if where the mask and the third sleeper are the same thing, and it's not a metaphor but their actual plan to possess Adam like it did in Ronan's dream in order to get whatever it is its (their?) nefarious plans require.
> 
> This is embarrassingly id-ficcish, with a lot of hurt!Ronan, and was really written just to entertain myself. I apologize in advance for the nonsense. 
> 
> **WARNINGS:** There's some non-consensual touching/kissing because Kavinsky, who is Kavinsky even in dream form. Also the third sleeper, who breaks into Ronan's mind and is generally very violating. Also much talk surrounding Ronan's attempted suicide. The minor character death refers to Orphan Girl, who is rather gruesomely killed in this (I did mention the horror story vibe, right?). And finally mass spoilers for all three books. Read at your own peril, etc.

**Prologue**

300 Fox Way was _not_ , thought Calla, in any way equipped to deal with boys.

Nor, thought Calla, was Calla.

300 Fox Way was a center of female energy. Vibrant, pulsing, whimsical, _clean_ energy. Or if not clean then at least the kind of dirty that came with a note that said _I'm sorry_ or _I.O.U._ Men were occasionally permitted on a temporary basis, and only after a lengthy and thorough background check on both legal and psychic bases, and only by a majority vote of 300 Fox Way's three reigning queens. It was an occasional occurrence, like Mr. Gray (who was the kind that was dirty and came with the note), and the few times it had happened had been either during lulls in excitement or, more often, on occasions of love sprung from horniness. All of these chosen were great men, or tragic men, and definitely well-hung men. Men who could be of use. And most importantly all of them were _grown_ men - adults and capable of behaving like one.

Boys, on the other hand, were none of these things. Boys had no business being here. Especially self-aggrandizing Aglionby raven boys. Especially _these_ self-aggrandizing Aglionby raven boys.

Calla and Maura stood at one of the front windows, Maura sipping at her first drink, Calla at her second (possibly third), and Gwenllian cackling delightedly from somewhere to their left. Outside, a black suburban pulled into the gravel drive, followed a minute later by Mr. Gray's white Mitsubishi. Maura asked, "Where were Mr. Gray and Butternut? I didn't realize they weren't in the house."

"I sent them to the store," said Calla. Running errands was one of the reasons she allowed them to stay here. Maura made a pleased sound, and they clinked their cocktail glasses as they watched Richard Gansey III get out of the driver's side of the suburban. He looked frazzled, and was wearing an appalling tangerine polo shirt. Possibly because he'd had to forego his appalling tangerine Camaro. The ghost had been sitting in the passenger seat, and then suddenly wasn't; he reappeared beside Gansey, who wrenched open the back door to reveal Coca-Cola's skinny ass.

"Hm," said Maura.

"Only your child would fall in love with this mess." Calla told her, meaning all of them. She remembered her own teenage years far too clearly to entertain the idea of any progeny of her own being a step up, but she thought that Persephone probably would have birthed a delightful spawn. Odd, whimsical, far too weird for Aglionby boys. She would probably have been asexual, or better yet a lesbian. In any case it would have been hilarious watching Persephone communicate with a baby. Calla said, "If one of us was going to get knocked up, it should've been P."

Maura sighed. "I know."

It took all three kids to haul out whatever else was in the back seat, which turned out to be the snake. He had a bloody nose and was struggling against his friends, faintly, and didn't appear to be entirely conscious. He had a fat lip, too, but that probably wasn't uncommon; he had a mouth on him that deserved a fat lip more often than not. Calla sneered at the sight of him, and Maura sighed louder at the sight of Blue, who climbed out after him. She was wearing leggings, what appeared to be a shredded drape, and combat boots.

Blue and Gansey looked like they were arguing about something in very controlled voices as the snake wobbled on his feet, and the ghost was whispering in Coca-Cola's ear. The whole scene reminded Calla of _Dawson's Creek_ , which she, Maura, Persephone, and Jimi had spent three weeks over the summer marathoning. There was a lot of drama in the air. It smelled like teen angst. Calla could almost hear the swell of moody indie pop in the background.

The ghost moved to Blue as voices started to rise and soothingly pet the tufts of her spiky hair, and Gansey, mouth in a straight line, managed to get one of the snake's arms around his shoulders. Coca-Cola ducked under the other one. They made it three steps toward the house before the snake's legs gave out. His dead weight would have dragged them both down, but Mr. Gray and Butternut rushed to help.

"Such gentlemen," said Maura proudly. "Mr. Gray looks good in that shirt, doesn't he?"

He did. His shirt was the same as every other shirt he owned, but navy blue instead of gray, which Maura considered a step in the right direction, whatever that meant. It was, just then, irrelevant. Calla clicked her tongue unhappily. "I didn't know all of them were coming. I thought we'd just have to deal with two of them."

Granted, it was the two that she liked least, but it still seemed better for the math.

"It's less clear with only two of us," said Maura.

She was right. Calla closed her mouth around her cocktail straw with a sour face.

To their left, Gwenllian cooed, "Ooooooo."

She was at the next window, her nose and chest squashed against the glass. She wore one of Orla's skirts and no top. It was a good bet that the bare tits of a mad fifteenth century witch would make all of these ridiculous boys very uncomfortable, so Calla didn't protest. 

"Ooooooo," Gwenllian said again. She really was just abso-fucking-lutely insane. She pulled her face from the window to smile wildly at Calla and Maura as she sing-songed, "The raven prince does not want to play."

Sure enough, the snake had started struggling again, on the ground now where they'd lowered him. His mouth looked less cruel than usual, and his lips fuller, open around a protest, though his eyes stayed closed. His brow was furrowed and his arms were straining, holding hard to Butternut's wrists. His bare feet were bloody and kicking at the ground. He looked grumpy and brittle, as he always did, but _more_. Maybe because of all the blood on his face.

"God, he's loud," Calla complained. Maura nodded, pressing a hand to her temple and wincing. All of Blue's raven boys were noisy, but this one - more raven than the rest - was loudest of all, and right now he was screaming.

Not physically, of course. Physically, his body had become too weak to fight and Mr. Gray was picking him up like a new bride, but his energy — sharp angry vicious self-loathing bright happy fulfilled untamed grieving vengeful terrified elated — was in anguish. He was Calla's least favorite and she didn't want him here. The role of willful asshole had been filled in this house, thanks, long before Ronan Niall Lynch was a razor blade gleaming in his dream mother's dream eye. He was a deplorable boy. Except, of course, that he wasn't a boy at all. Not really. Calla idly wondered what his card was. They never had gotten him to draw one.

His pet bird was digging its claws in Blue's arm, but she didn't seem to notice. The snake looked both smaller and larger cradled to Mr. Gray's broad chest. Calla scowled at him. Next to her, Maura said, "Can Adam hear him too?"

Calla slid her gaze easily from the snake to Coca-Cola, who was scowling at the snake as fiercely as Calla was, but in a different way. Calla watched him take the snake's limp arm and fold it gently over his middle. When their skin touched some of the tension leaked out of Coca-Cola's wiry shoulders, but he flinched, too, and then stepped neatly out of the way as though he'd never been there. He held the same hand to his mouth, and then to his cheek, and then rubbed the back of his neck before shoving both fists into the pockets of his raggedy jeans. He ducked his head, wincing.

"Apparently," said Calla.

Maura frowned. "It's early for those two, isn't it?" She tilted her head, eyes narrowing thoughtfully. "They got there so fast."

"Teenage boys," said Calla. "No stamina."

Maura hummed, and then blinked, and then laughed. Calla smirked. As one, they looked around for Persephone to join in the joke, and as one they remembered she was gone. Calla wasn't used to the feeling yet, like a limb had been cut off, but worse. There was an empty void in her where Persephone used to be. She could feel the same absence in Maura.

The trouble with having soulmates was losing them.

Maura's eyes were wet. She knocked back the rest of her drink and went to open the door. The snake's dream bird darted inside, flapping her wings with bereft agitation, and Blue stumbled in next. She said, " _Mom!_ "

" _Blue!_ " Maura replied in the same tone. She stuck her tongue out when Blue glared at her. To Mr. Gray, she grinned and said, "Hiya."

Mr. Gray smiled. "Hello."

Maura blushed happily. Calla gagged.

Up close, they could see that the snake's straight nose wasn't broken, and it was still bleeding, and that his eyes were moving rapidly behind his closed eyelids. It was hard to see through the blood if the fever was flushing his cheeks, but he radiated heat. He was too long to fit nicely in Mr. Gray's arms, his head lolling like a doll's, but Mr. Gray shifted him slightly to support it with his arm. Maura seemed to appreciate this very much. She said, "Put him in the reading room, please?"

"Certainly," said Mr. Gray. Before he could go, Maura rocked onto her toes to kiss his cheek. He smiled again, cuddled his burden closer, and wandered off to do as she'd said. Good man. The annoying bird followed.

As they left, Coca-Cola and Gansey stepped inside followed by Butternut, each of them carrying several bags of groceries. Butternut smiled awkwardly, eyes flickering first to Blue, then away, then back again. It had been weeks, but he still seemed shocked every time he saw her face. Maybe back in the olden days of whenever-the-hell he was from, he'd been celibate, or had never gotten around to learning that what he and Maura got up to would result in a baby. He'd been equally flummoxed when Maura was pregnant. If Blue had noticed the way he looked at her, she didn't show it. She was cautious of him.

Good. She was learning.

"Those can go in the kitchen," Calla said, pointing at the groceries. It was obvious, but the little morons looked lost, and she was a benevolent god. Gansey at least seemed happy to have a chore. Blue took the bags off Butternut and she and Coca-Cola followed where Gansey led. The ghost, still outside, shuffled a few centimeters over the threshold and made a face.

"Noah?" Maura said. "You can come in, kiddo. We've got more than enough to go around tonight. Blue overloads when she's upset."

The ghost sighed mournfully and shuffled the rest of the way inside. "I know."

Maura led him into the kitchen, and Calla stayed where she was to finish her drink. Butternut said, "Something is wrong."

"I know," said Calla. She said it in the same mournful voice as the ghost had, but Butternut didn't get the joke. He was useless. To Gwenllian, she snapped, "Put a shirt on!" and then stomped off after the others.

The kitchen wasn't meant to fit so many people, but they'd been stretching those boundaries in this house for over a decade, so Calla hardly noticed. She and Maura sat at the table and played a game of dots on what might have been Blue's algebra homework while the groceries were put away with quiet efficiency. Maura won, and Calla swore lengthily. By the time she was finished, Gansey, Blue, and the ghost had taken seats at the table with them. Coca-Cola leaned against the wall just inside the doorway.

"I'm so sorry to impose," Gansey was saying to Maura. He looked less Congressional than he usually did. There were stress lines around his mouth and eyes. Maybe that was more Congressional. His voice was steady. "We didn't know what to do. It didn't seem natural. Noah suggested we bring him here, that you might be able to help. We…"

He trailed off, looking a million miles away. The ghost, Blue, and Coca-Cola all looked unsettled and had a short conversation with their eyebrows before Blue turned back to her mother.

"He just." She flapped a hand urgently, which would have been unhelpful if she weren't Blue. Since she was, the closer her hand came to Calla, the more specific the details became, and the louder it got. "He was fine!"

"Were you in Cabeswater?" Maura asked. Coca-Cola went abruptly stock still. His head tilted almost unnaturally, like a bird with a broken neck. He was suddenly, and visibly, Other. Persephone's mannerisms had been strange too, after she'd —

Calla stopped the thought in its tracks. There were some secrets she kept even from herself.

"No," Blue said impatiently. "We were at Monmouth! He and Noah were playing pool, and he just." She waved her hand again, this time at Gansey, who found the word she'd lost. He finished her sentence. "Collapsed." He frowned. "That's not the right word, but I can't think of a better one."

Coca-Cola did an illogical thing with his neck again. He let his gaze trail between Maura and Calla. It was a little pointed and arrogantly knowing, for her tastes. "Like a marionette," he said, "with its strings cut."

Calla stared at him with a frown. Maura stared at him with her mouth slightly open and eyebrows threatening to disappear into her hairline. Blue stared at him like she wasn't sure if she was going to agree with him or punch him in the face. Gansey didn't stare at him at all. Gansey was looking at his hand, which had snake blood on it. When he said, "Adam," in a disapproving way, Coca-Cola's shoulders hunched and he looked away.

"You could have taken him to a hospital," Calla pointed out.

The ghost shook his head. He looked less like a ghost than he usually did. "It's not that kind of problem."

"Please," Gansey said. He seemed both very young and very old. "Can you do a reading? Or a trance or - Can you give us any information?"

Maura shook her head. "Sorry, we don't know very much, only that he's trapped somewhere we can't see."

"Cabeswater?" Blue asked, aghast.

It was Coca-Cola who answered, "No."

"Cabeswater wouldn't hurt him," said the ghost.

Calla bared her teeth at him until his shoulders crawled up past his ears, and then shared a look with Maura. Calla's eyebrows said _Send them home_. Maura's replied _We can't ask them leave their friend._ Calla's said _Wanna bet?_. Months ago, when Blue first got mixed up with these damn brats, the women of 300 Fox Way had divvied up the assignments: Maura got the pretty ticking time bomb who would break Blue's heart, Persephone got the train wreck, and Calla got the snake.

Thus far hers had been pretty content to take care of or wallow in his own messes. She should've known that he was just letting it build up to something like this. She crossed her arms over her chest, already mourning all the sleep she wasn't going to get while she babysat.

"He'll have to stay here," Maura said.

Calla glared at the other boys. "I assume that means you will be too?"

Gansey and Coca-Cola shared a look, and then Coca-Cola said, polite instead of eerie, "If it won't be an imposition."

"It will," Calla said, at the same time Maura said, "Of course not." Calla let her teeth grind. "You two can bunk in Persephone's room," she told Gansey and Coca-Cola. "And take your ghost with you."

"Rude," said the ghost.

Blue drummed her fingers loudly on the table top. Her eyes were very big. Gansey had seemed a million miles away from the entire conversation, but now he couldn't seem to tear his gaze off Blue's big eyes. Calla's cold black heart throbbed with ache. They should have been able to protect Blue from the inevitable future looming ever closer. They should have been able to do a lot of things.

"But what's wrong with Ronan?" Blue insisted.

Maura made a show of pinching her daughter's cheek affectionately. "Well, we'll just have to ask him when he wakes up, won't we?"

Blue said, " _Pshaw_."

Before anyone could say anything else, Gwenllian swanned in, dancing in wide sweeping motions, a grumpy-looking Orla behind her. She was still topless. The ghost blushed so badly he looked like a real boy, and Gansey and Coca-Cola both goggled, and then looked at Blue, who glared at them murderously. Calla cackled.

"Six six nine," Gwenllian sang, twirling. She dipped low and then careened upward directly at Orla until their noses touched. Orla jerked away with a swear. Gwenllian laughed and laughed and laughed, and then she coughed and looked at Calla. "Six or nine?"

Calla considered. She took Blue's hand and then considered again. "Nine and a quarter," she said.

Gwenllian blew a raspberry as she swept out of the room. "Sleeper wakes. Dreamer dreams. Nine, Nine, Nine!"

"And a quarter!" Maura shouted after her.

"Put some clothes on!" Blue shouted louder.

Gansey folded his bloody hands politely on the table. Inexplicably, every ounce of attention in the room was at once under his command. He cleared his throat and asked, "Will he be all right?"

Maura pretended she didn't hear him. Calla rose to make another drink, and when she got back she said, "We're not good with specifics."

Down the hall in the reading room, the snake continued to scream.

 

 

Adam waited fifteen minutes after Gansey had snuck out of the bedroom that had once been Persephone's to get out of the bed that had once been Persephone's. The house was very quiet. It was just after two in the morning. Gansey hadn't slept, but he rarely did. Adam hadn't either, and he felt like it.

Exhaustion sunk deep into his bones, but that was nothing new. He hadn't planned on sleeping at all that night. He'd only pretended to so that Gansey could do what he so clearly wanted to without Adam knowing. So that Adam could do what he wanted to without Gansey knowing.

The window was blocked by gauzy purple curtains. Adam pushed them gently aside. It was hot in this room, hot enough that he'd taken his shirt off to crawl under the blankets, but goosebumps rose on his skin as he peered out the window. Blue and Gansey were in the backyard, sitting among the roots of the beech tree that took up most of it. He could only see their shadows and their tangled legs. He imagined Blue resting her head on Gansey's square chest, Gansey resting his chin on top of her spiky hair, his arms around her.

If Adam hadn't lost his temper that day, would she still be his girlfriend? If he hadn't tried to kiss her, would they be curled up under that tree together right now? If he hadn't screwed it up, would she still look at him and see someone she knew she could never love? Did she love Gansey? Adam felt wrought with tension. The girl Adam had liked. The girl Gansey had noticed the night they met her only because Adam had. Adam's fist clenched at his side. Everything. Gansey had already had _everything_ , and now he had Blue, too.

And less than six months to live.

All at once Adam's breath left his body. He sagged against the wall, braced himself with both hands on the window frame. What was wrong with him? Jesus, what the hell was wrong with him? When he closed his eyes he saw Gansey's face from earlier in the afternoon when the world had swept out from under them. Adam hadn't been facing the pool table. He'd been wearing headphones. He hadn't heard Blue's alarmed voice, or seen Ronan stagger. What he'd seen was Gansey's expression shift from studious to smiling to surprise to bright, abject horror. He'd looked more human than Adam had ever seen him. In the reflection off his glasses, Adam had watched Ronan's nose start to bleed. He'd only turned around in time to see him fall.

He opened his eyes and took a calming breath, then pushed himself upright and picked his T-shirt up off the foot of the bed and put it on. He grabbed the velvet bag that held the Tarot deck Persephone had given him off the bedside table. She was all over this room. He could feel her through layers and layers of absence. Time was circular, sometimes.

Cabeswater was in torment. For hours now it had been pulling tugging twisting demanding biting tearing crying pleading with Adam. Cabeswater so badly wanted him to go to the Greywaren. He was its hands and eyes, but no more than that. His mind was his own. His will was his own.

He went to Ronan.

He knew that the stairs creaked, but he knew how to step to avoid the noise; he'd learned how to find the quietest path at his father's knee. It was colder downstairs, and so still. It seemed impossible that it could be, with the number of people that were usually crammed inside, but the kitchen was empty and so was the living room. No one was in the hall. The door to the reading room was closed but not locked, and Adam let himself silently inside. Candles had been lit all around the room so that the lower half was illuminated. Ronan was on the floor, a sharp, wounded creature under shifting shadows.

The only furniture in the reading room was the reading table and the mismatched chairs around it, but the house was used to guests and stocked for them. A twin-sized inflatable mattress had been crammed against the wall. Adam wished he would have thought to tell them that they didn't need to bother with something like that; when Ronan needed comfort he usually found it on the floor. He didn't trust soft things.

He'd moved in his sleep, dragged the nest of sleeping bag/sheets/blankets/pillows off the air mattress with him. Adam knelt down at his side.

Ronan was very still, and his chest was rising and falling evenly. His mouth was closed. He was shivering with cold, fever raging, dark hair damp with sweat. He was even paler than usual so the circles under his eyes looked like black bruises, but his blood-stained tank top and expensive jeans had been removed and his face had been cleaned. Someone who didn't know him well could probably see him like this and think he was peaceful, but Adam knew better. He hadn't known Ronan as well as he'd thought he had, but he was learning. Since he'd watched Ronan's doppleganger die slow and bloody in the church, sacrificed to the horrors in his mind, Adam had made a point of learning.

He didn't need Cabeswater to tell him that whatever was happening to him, Ronan was in agony, but he pulled his Tarot deck out and checked anyway. The fool, the seven of cups, the seven of wands, the ten of wands, the five of coins, the ten of swords, the eight of swords. He was trapped and fighting to free himself, but his strength was failing under torture. A choice between two outcomes had to be made and both were horrific. He was not alone, but struggling with terrible loneliness. He was being hurt, and…being made to hurt? Being forced to hurt someone else? There was such suffocating darkness.

Adam shook himself out of it. The reading was difficult and uncomfortable, and he wasn't adept enough yet. He stacked the cards neatly, set them aside, and touched two fingers to the racing pulse in Ronan's neck.

Someone behind him said, "You could have stayed with him if you wanted."

It was Calla. She wasn't bothering to keep her voice down. Adam looked up at her. She wore a mint green robe and red slippers. Her hair was pulled back. She looked dangerous, but Adam wasn't anymore afraid of her than he'd ever been of Ronan. He cleared his dry throat. "Gansey would have too. I didn't want him to worry."

"But he should be worried," Calla pointed out.

Adam felt his mouth tighten. He didn't owe her his secrets, but he wasn't sure this was one, anyway. "I wanted to be alone with him."

Calla clucked her tongue. If he'd hoped that she'd respect his wishes, that hope was quickly dashed. She walked further into the room and pulled out one of the chairs at the reading table and dragged it closer, dropping into it with a loud sigh. Adam said, "Why aren't you sleeping?"

"Oh, trust me, duck, I would be. My luck of the draw, though." She nodded to Ronan. "I'm here to check on the monster."

Anger prickled underneath Adam's skin. "Don't call him that. He's not a monster."

"Not a snake right now either," Calla snorted. "And never a human. What should we call him?"

Adam opened his mouth, and closed it again. He couldn't argue. It wasn't false. Niall Lynch might have been human, but that couldn't really be verified. Aurora Lynch was an extension of Niall, a dream. Ronan was both: man and extension, dreamer and dream. Adam shook his head. "He's not the monster."

That was Adam. That had always been Adam.

"He's loud, whatever he is. Do you hear him?" Calla tried to ask it casually. She might have succeeded if that question could ever be taken in a casual way.

"Hear him what?" Adam asked.

"Hm," Calla said. Minutes passed before she pressed, "Not at all?"

She was infuriating. Adam didn't know what she meant, but he didn't like the implication. He could imagine how Ronan might sound to a psychic right now. He couldn't hear Ronan, but he could feel Cabeswater, and he could feel the ley line. The Magician sees what's out there and finds connections. The Magician can make anything magical. Persephone had said that Adam's power wasn't about other people, but she'd been wrong. Part of his power was about _this_ person, because Adam wanted it to be.

"No," he answered. "I'm not a psychic. I can hear Cabeswater."

"Ah," Calla said. "That's right, because you march into supernatural forests and make bargains you don't have the first clue about or the brains to avoid."

Adam ignored her. Ronan turned onto his side, suddenly restless, eerily silent. The muscles in his chest and shoulders strained and his breath hitched before evening out. The hook of his tattoo looked liquid in the candlelight, and his heart was beating so rapidly Adam could see his pulse in his neck. There was something obscene about him like this, brittle, delicate. Adam let himself look.

Like all the Lynch brothers Ronan was handsome, but unlike Matthew or Declan, the dark, mean parts of Ronan made him beautiful too. He wasn't beautiful like Helen Gansey was, on a pedestal and utterly unobtainable. He was beautiful like a jungle cat, all sleek muscle and deliberate, threatening grace and the sharpest of fangs. Attempting to get close meant risking certain death, better to avoid all together. But every once in a while you caught sight of him when he didn't know he was being watched, and the possibility of having him unguarded like that even for a moment was worth dying for.

Adam's eyes trailed over Ronan's close-cut dark hair, over the curve of his ear, the cruel set of his jawline, down the dip of his neck and over his flank and flat abdomen, back up again when he got dizzy, over the definition of his arm and his elegant, long-fingered hand. The flickering light caught on his skin and Adam frowned, curious, and took Ronan's hand to turn his forearm into the light.

Scars. Adam knew at once what they were from, but couldn't remember ever seeing them before. He had a very good memory, especially for painful things. The night Ronan had tried to kill himself, Adam had only known them for a couple of months, and while that was plenty of time to become the best of friends with Gansey and as close as you could get with Noah, Ronan had still been a stranger Adam didn't particularly want to get to know. For him, it hadn't hurt because of Ronan, it had hurt because of everyone else. Noah hadn't spoken for weeks. Gansey had been crying.

Adam's father had caught him trying to sneak out that night, so he hadn't seen what Ronan's arms looked like before they'd been sewn back together, only the bandages the next day. He couldn't remember how long they'd been covered, or when the wrapping had come off. He'd always assumed that Gansey's horrified mind had embellished the extent of the damage.

"Jesus," he breathed, and then remembered he wasn't alone. For a moment, he tried to conceal the scars, sure that Ronan wouldn't want this demon shared, but Calla said, "Don't bother. I know all about that."

Adam frowned, wondering if Blue had told her, but that seemed wildly out of character. Instead, he asked, "Did you see it when you touched him that day at the reading?"

"No, I saw it in his medical file." Before Adam could even begin to grasp the implications of _that_ , Calla added, "Never let it be said that dreams can't hurt you."

Adam made a face. "Only his. And they only hurt him."

"Is that right," Calla said. She didn't say it like a question.

Earlier in the year, before school had started back up, Gansey had confided in Adam that it had been a night horror, that Ronan hadn't really been trying to kill himself. He'd been so palpably relieved that Adam hadn't had the heart to disagree, but on the whole he figured that was up for debate. Ronan could only pull things from dreams when he knew he was dreaming. Gansey hadn't been in Cabeswater on the night of the 4th of July. He hadn't seen Ronan make the decision to not hate himself anymore. Maybe suicide was too strong of a word. Maybe it had been attempted murder by self-loathing. Like Ronan himself, his demons never did things by halves. Not with the right motivation.

It wasn't something they talked about. Ronan had still been a stranger then. Adam tried to imagine himself asking the question now a year later, late one night or early one morning in the darkness of Adam's apartment. _Did you want to die? If so, do you still?_

The entire room was rattling. His vision had been splicing intermittently for hours. Cabeswater was writhing with worry and anger and fear. He couldn't hear the language of the trees like Ronan could, but the surge of feeling he understood. Cabeswater hadn't used fear to reach him in months, but it seemed beyond itself now. Normally it would have been terrifying, but he was already terrified all on his own.

"I never noticed them before," he admitted, ashamed. He wished that it were Blue here, instead of Calla. It was harder to confess failure the way he wanted to to a psychic.

Calla flashed him an incongruous smile. "They gave you other things to notice," she said.

Ronan made a sound, more than a whimper, less than a scream. The furniture started to rattle but Calla didn't appear to hear it. Cabeswater communicating with Adam, pleading. It whispered in the language he didn't know. The only word he understood was Greywaren. _I don't know what to do_ , he thought. _You haven't asked me for anything. I don't know how to fix him._

He looked at Calla. "What do you mean ‘they'?"

"Well, he's Cabeswater's, isn't he?"

Adam narrowed his eyes at her. "It doesn't own him."

Calla smirked. "He wears its brand."

"No. I—" Adam said, startled. He wanted to argue, but he couldn't. There were too many possibilities. He was afraid that she might be right. He finished lamely, "No."

"Uh huh," Calla deadpanned. She moved her chair again. The legs scraped over the floor. "How many people do you think live through wounds that leave scars like that?"

Entranced, Adam grazed his fingertip over the largest of them. All of them were thick, jagged lines of scar tissue with branches like trees, puckered like puncture wounds. It didn't look so much like a blade had been taken to his arms as it did like they'd been fed into a shredder from wrists to elbows. The simple answer to Calla's rhetorical question was zero.

"He should have bled out," Adam murmured. It felt wrong to say out loud, but he knew it was true. The damage was too extensive, the knotted tissue so deeply set that they were hard to the touch, something solid wedged to the bone. The amount of blood he would have been losing from wounds like that – he should've been dead in seconds. His night horrors hadn't only tried to tear him apart, they'd succeeded. How long had Cabeswater been keeping Ronan Lynch alive?

"He's the Greywaren," Calla said.

"So was Kavinsky," said Adam. "So was Niall Lynch. That didn't save them."

An insane cackle filtered into the room. They both turned to see Gwenllian step in, walking on her toes. She was already so tall that Adam only noticed because she stumbled. She was wearing a long nightgown and her voluminous hair touched the ceiling. All evidence to the contrary, she looked more sane than she had yet. Her eyes flashed at Adam. "You speak with authority you do not have. Whispering in ears. Telling lies." She smiled. "But you're good at those, aren't you?"

Adam didn't dignify that with a response. Glendower's daughter could see right through him, and what she saw she didn't like. It made him anxious to think about, so he didn't. Gwenllian broke into a lilting voice, her teaching voice, "Many thieves, one Greywaren. Many forests, one Greywaren. Only ever one. Only ever him." She pointed at Ronan. "Eternal."

She smiled beatifically, and then chomped her teeth at Calla. "Calla lily."

"Clever," Calla deadpanned.

Gwenllian shrugged. "Everyone always thought so."

"Ugh," said Calla.

Adam's head throbbed. In Gansey's journal, next to a doodle of a bird driving the Camaro, Gansey had written: _greywaren (Greywaren?): "…an object that lets the owner take things from dreams." - M. Sargent (July, 2014). Object? Owner? ‘The' implies singularity._

And so it did. Only one. All of those Cabeswaters all over the world, older than time, reaching for each other, wrapped tight around the Greywaren, and only one Ronan, barely eighteen and made of sharp edges coated in venom.

"If you're going to stay in here, sit down and shut up," Calla barked at Gwenllian. Gwenllian stared at her creepily for a long time, and then pulled up a chair on Calla's left and sat down with her hands folded neatly on her lap. Satisfied, Calla turned back to Adam. She jabbed a finger at him. "Listen, Coca-Cola, Persephone may have already warned you, but I'm telling you again: you need to be careful."

"Of what?" Adam didn't mean to sound petulant. There were so many things he needed to be careful of.

"Cabeswater, the bargain you made, him," she gestured to Ronan.

Adam wet his chapped lips, anxious. "For his sake or mine?"

Calla scoffed. "Does it matter? You're such martyrs. You worst of all."

"I didn't mean it like that," Adam said irritably. "I meant that the more I know, the better. I want to get all of us through this. I'm not being dense on purpose, and I'm not trying to be impolite, I just don't understand these things. All of you - even Persephone -" He paused, pained, and then guilty because his pain was nothing to Calla's, who had known Persephone her whole life. "You all talk to me as if I know what I'm doing, and no one has ever explained any of it. This isn't stuff I can look up in the library."

Calla gave him a look as though he was even more of an idiot than she'd already suspected, but before she could verbally eviscerate him, Gwenllian broke in. "Partner trumps pet, even a favorite one," she said, tilting her head so far to the side her cheek rested on her shoulder. She pointed at Adam and sneered, "Partner," and then at Ronan and grinned wickedly, "Pet."

"He doesn't belong to it," Adam said. The words came out low and angry. He hadn't even known he was going to say anything, but he meant it.

"Pets always belong to someone," Gwenllian said. "Especially dangerous ones. It's all they want."

Ronan's brow furrowed and he pulled his arms into his chest, let out another quiet whimper. Adam touched his fevered cheek and his breath caught in his throat when Ronan turned his face into his hand. Adam could count on one hand the number of times he'd initiated contact between them.

Between one second and the next, the lights began to flash on and off and the wall behind Ronan filled with apparitions. All of them were talking over one another in effort to be heard, louder than the trees. They were furious, writhing, frothing at the mouth. All the candles went out. Adam was freezing. Shaking. Behind his closed eyes he saw Ronan as he had been by the organ at St. Agnes, convulsing, gasping, holding his throat, touching his lips, covered in blood. He didn't realize he was scrying until he jerked out of it. His eyes weren't closed at all. The candles were still lit. He'd gotten lost in the flame. _It's not real. It's not real._

All at once, everything stopped. The world righted itself. The sudden silence made Adam feel very small. Gwenllian cleared her throat loudly, leaning so far forward in her chair that the tip of her nose nearly touched the floor.

"Quiet, little wretch," she said to Adam. Her dislike of him was a tangible thing. She took Calla's hand and touched Ronan's leg. Put upon, Calla bent to touch Ronan's shoulder, closing the circle, Adam caught in the center. Gwenllian's smile was toothy. "He wakes."

 

 

Exactly nine hours and fifteen minutes after he'd collapsed, Ronan woke up.

He woke up with vines stuffed into his screaming mouth, their thorns biting into his cheeks. He woke up with his heart pounding and his gut churning and a blue flower crushed in his palm. He woke up and everything hurt. He wasn't floating above his body the way he usually did. His vision was white, and then blurred. His eyes burned. Long fingers pulled the vines away, cool hands touched his wet face. They smelled faintly like moss. _Adam_.

Ronan turned onto his side, tried to pick himself up and made it halfway to his hands and knees in time to cough a wad of blood onto the wood floor. Adam's hand curled around the back of his neck and a sob wrenched out of Ronan's chest. The white noise in his ears was deafening, the pressure in his head explosive. He felt like he'd been set on fire. He was afraid to open his eyes again. He was dying. Was he dying? He couldn't yet. Everything was so fucking loud. He hated the taste of blood.

Hands touched his back - smaller hands, not Adam's - and everything that had been bad became so much worse, amplified, surging. He retched, tried to get away, scrambling, fingernails tearing into the floor, body distorting in agony. There was nowhere to go. He was still trapped. Someone was laughing, laughing, laughing—

There were lips at his ear. Dry, thin, familiar. " _Ronan_."

Ronan clenched his teeth and opened his eyes. Adam's elegant features swam into focus. He looked afraid. Maybe it was just the candlelight. Ronan tried to say his name but his teeth were chattering too hard. Adam swiped his thumb through the tears on his face.

"You're awake. I swear you're awake," Adam said, like a promise. Promises could be broken. Ronan's arms were about to buckle. He didn't know where he was. Maybe somewhere underwater. Maybe he was drowning. Maybe he'd already drowned. Lying down hurt less, so he did that, but his coordination was off and Adam had to help. He guided Ronan's head onto his lap and his jeans smelled like dust and motor oil.

Someone — Blue? — said, "Ronan?" 

Somewhere close by, in a small voice, Gansey said, " _please_."

A mass of dark hair obscured Ronan's vision. Fingers touched his forehead and fear jolted his heart. He couldn't catch his breath. "Please, don't make me sleep again," he whispered.

"You must," the hair said cheerfully. "Goodnight, little prince."

He slept.

He dreamt of winter in Cabeswater. The trees were crying in relief. And in grief. Orphan Girl was in pieces on the ground; an arm next to an old birch tree, half of her leg in a bush a few feet from that. Her upper body was face up, other arm still attached, hand clutching her skull cap. Her eyes were open and terrified, unseeing. There were still tear tracks on her cheeks. The snow was drenched red. He didn't have a shovel and he couldn't seem to remember how to talk to ask for one, and even if he could he wouldn't have. Cabeswater had sacrificed so much for him already. A piece of itself.

He used his bare hands to dig and it took hours, or maybe weeks, or maybe seconds, or maybe one second that stretched eternally. He put Orphan Girl in the hole, set all her pieces where they were meant to be so she was human shaped again, and then scooped all the bloody snow in too before he buried her. The sky was dark gray. He couldn't tell if it was day or night and then it occurred to him that it was both. Between one breath and the next, he remembered his voice.

"Me paenitet," he whispered. He didn't have anything with him to mark the grave, but it was the only muddy part of an otherwise pristine landscape. Ronan went to the stream to wash his hands. It seemed like he'd spent a lot of time this year burying bodies.

The trees were speaking. _We do not blame you for your choice, Greywaren._

"You should've given it me," Ronan said. "I should have made it take me."

The trees replied, _he cannot have you._

Everything to do with magic and the ley line seemed to require a sacrifice. Cabeswater asked for trust, freely given. The mask demanded a soul, by any means necessary. Ronan had a feeling he'd only gotten a taste of those means. In movies, the good guys never gave up intel even when tortured. Ronan, a fastidious keeper of secrets, had always found it heroic. It hadn't seemed like fiction that even the worst pain couldn't break loyalty of that caliber. 

Shock of shocks, he'd been wrong. It turned out pain was effective as all shit. His own soul apparently wasn't up for grabs, but its guide had been. He'd fed the mask Orphan Girl to keep it from Adam. If he had a thousand more chances he'd make the same choice with every one of them.

 _We want you to be happy,_ Cabeswater told him. _We wish you did not want the magician._

Ronan snorted. "Would sure as shit make life a little easier, wouldn't it?"

_He will leave._

"I know."

_He will not stay for you._

"I wouldn't ask him to," said Ronan.

Cabeswater rustled unhappily. Snow was falling again. He felt numb, and then tender like a wound. He was shivering with cold and the ink on his back burned. He shoved his cold hands into his armpits and lay down into the snow, eyelids heavy.

He slept.

He dreamt of Kavinsky.

"Hey, sweetheart." Kavinsky smiled like a psychopath. He pushed Ronan onto the hood of the Camaro and snorted a line of coke off his abs. He smeared his mouth up Ronan's torso. Ronan said "no" but Kavinsky kissed him anyway. He was all teeth like a shark. Ronan's lips felt raw after. Kavinsky hummed against his cheek. "I dreamed you. I dreamed you over and over and over again. No matter how hard I tried it wouldn't let me take you. It wouldn't let me take you."

"I won't let you take me," Ronan said.

"Consent is overrated." Kavinsky said.

"K," Ronan muttered. His skin was crawling. Kavinsky's nightmare had killed him, and he'd been allowed to die. "Is it better?"

Kavinsky kissed the side of his neck, soft, like a lover. "No."

 _Dying's a boring side effect_ , Ronan thought.

Into Ronan's ear like a secret, Kavinsky murmured, "I loved you. Did you know that? God, I fucking loved you. More than anything. I wanted to give you the world, Lynch. Why wouldn't you let me love you?"

"I don't think you even know what that is," Ronan said honestly.

Kavinsky kissed him again. His teeth sank into the plush of Ronan's bottom lip until there was blood and Ronan swore soundly and shoved him away. Kavinsky fell backwards into the mouth of the dragon he'd made from fire, sat on its tongue like a king on a throne, legs open, hand down the front of his jeans, touching himself.

"Baby," Kavinsky said, "your chest is open."

Startled, Ronan looked down, reached into his open ribcage and touched his black heart.

He slept.

He dreamt of the mask, which was a feeling. The third sleeper, which was a seduction. He was frozen with fear. His chest was still open, but that didn't matter; it had been thorough in Ronan's violation, it could not know him anymore intimately than it already did. The mask felt like it was smiling with all its sharp teeth. It didn't speak but it communicated, plunged into Ronan's head and made him think words like _underestimated_ and _worthy_. He'd never been more afraid. The mask's smile stitched his chest back together over the empty hole inside.

Then it was gone. Ronan took a breath and thought/screamed/wished: _Help_.

He slept.

He dreamt of home. He dreamt of the Barns. He dreamt of Declan, wearing sleep pants and a sour expression. He was pale with dark hair like Ronan, but taller and more built from obsessive weight lifting. He had a Ken Barbie haircut and looked like a senator, even in pajamas. Declan blinked at him stupidly for a moment, and then said, "Hell, you haven't done this since we were toddlers."

Was it really him?

Declan looked around the sprawling farm and his mouth tightened. He murmured, "I hate this place."

It was him. Ronan wanted to hit him, but that wasn't anything new. He watched Declan shove his fists into the pockets of his pajamas and tried to remember how to talk to him without punching him. He had a thousand questions. "Are you like Dad?"

"No," Declan sneered. Ronan held out a handful of Declan's sleeping pills and Declan glanced from them lying haphazard in the palm of Ronan's hand back to Ronan's face. He said, "I have nightmares."

Ronan didn't understand what that meant.

"Regular ones. I don't take things out of them. I'm _nothing_ like Dad." Declan's tone suggested that having anything in common with Niall Lynch was the worst thing he could think of. "Don't look at me like that. You're so far up his ass you can't see what a jerk he was. He only cared about himself."

"He loved us," Ronan said. His hands were forming fists, but Declan looked furious and hurt and guilty. Like he was nursing bruises Ronan couldn't see. Like he'd caused some Ronan couldn't see either.

"Yeah, like he loved all the shit he owned," Declan spat. "He treated mom and Matthew like things. He treated you like a slightly more important thing. He didn't even see me. And he ruined us all. He's fucked us all over. We never should've been fucking born. I hated him. I still hate him." His fists clenched. "I'm glad he's dead."

Ronan hit him. Declan's head snapped to the side, his lip split and bloomed with bright red. The next second Ronan was on the ground and Declan's hand was clamped around his throat. He looked wild in a way he never did unless he and Ronan were fighting. Ronan gasped out, "You're lying."

Declan didn't speak for a long time. He was breathing hard, his nostrils flaring. His hand felt like steel around Ronan's neck. Finally, he said, "That's all there is. You think the truth works outside the Barns?"

Ronan didn't answer. He tried not to think of the fear that had eaten at his insides for years, that maybe at the base of it all, what he suffered wasn't supernatural, but madness.

"Look at you," Declan murmured meanly. He gripped Ronan's neck hard enough to cut of his air for a second, and then let go and stood up again. "You don't even know what you are. But I do."

"Fuck you," Ronan said. It took him a few seconds to get back to his feet, so he said it a few more times. "You don't know shit about me."

His brother smiled nastily. It was a smile he only used on Ronan. "You'd like to think that, wouldn't you? I know _everything_ about you. I know how dangerous you are. I know what an ungrateful prick you are. I know the only reason you're still in Aglionby is because Gansey can tug heartstrings with that stunt you pulled last year."

"It wasn't like that."

Declan snorted in disdain. "What are you going to do after you graduate, Ronan? Stay here in this fucking abomination of Dad's?" He threw his arm out, presenting the sloping expanse of their childhood home with a sardonic smile. "Here's your kingdom, kiddo. You can dream a whole life and die bloody right here just like he did. At least you being a pervert means the freak bloodline dies with you."

"Fuck you," Ronan repeated, and then, "How much do you know?"

Declan snorted. He was angry but not in a way Ronan had ever seen before. He looked different. He looked like a real person. "Everything he did. He made sure."

Ronan knew when someone was lying to him. Declan wasn't. It didn't happen often, and it hurt like hell now. "How long?"

"I don't know. I was eleven or twelve, I guess. He kept me updated from then." He looked away, out over the folds of Singer's Falls with longing and disgust. Not that Ronan had cared to try it often, but usually getting information out of Declan was almost impossible. Getting the _truth_ out of him was…well, apparently only accomplished in a dream. "Dad spent most of his life looking for the Greywaren. He wasn't quiet about it. He didn't know it was you."

"I hadn't been born yet," Ronan said, startled.

"It doesn't work like that," said Declan. He shrugged his big shoulders. "I said ‘I know', not ‘I understand.'"

"You never said anything," Ronan said, letting the accusation sound in his voice. He felt sick.

"Of course I didn't," Declan said. "We were kids, asshole. I wouldn't force that shit on a fucking child. Unlike him."

Ronan remembered being younger, remembered his dad coming home from wherever the hell he'd been and the whole house coming alive with excitement. He remembered Declan choosing all of his words very carefully, and Niall ignoring or laughing at him. He remembered Declan making a lot of interchangeable friends.

"Years ago," he said. "We haven't been kids for a long time."

"But you never really grew up, did you? You're still incapable of lying." Declan pointed at him for emphasis. "If they'd have threatened someone else you would have served yourself up on a silver platter. I didn't tell you because he told me not to. Jesus, Ronan, you're just as bad as he is. And if you stay here, they'll find you, but by all means, stay here anyway. God knows you don't give a shit about anyone else. Your pain is the only kind that matters. You're just fucking like him, and the worst part is how _proud_ you are of it."

Ronan's mouth tightened. His fingernails were digging into his palms. Before he'd died, Niall Lynch had let rumors spread. He'd made sure that when people came hunting, their first stop was his eldest. He'd sacrificed Declan for Ronan. To Declan, _grown up_ was synonymous with _tells lies_.

"D," Ronan said.

Declan shook his head. He was standing on an uneven spot of the ground where, three months ago, Ronan had dug into the earth to bury his own dead body. There was something poetic about that.

"You never asked," Declan said. He sounded sullen. "You never cared."

It wasn't like that. It was just that every conversation Ronan had ever had with Declan, even when they were kids, had felt like a trick.

"I was only trying to protect you, but I'm done," Declan said. "Do whatever you want, just leave me out of it. Don't pull me into your dreams again. Don't pull me into this. I'm keeping enough of your secrets."

He was lying. Ronan didn't know about which part.

"I'll wake up soon," Ronan told him.

"Good," Declan said, and turned away like he was going to fucking walk back to D.C. or something, but after a few steps he stopped. His shoulders were very straight. He said, "Ronan, don't take Matthew from me."

Nonplussed, Ronan said, "What?"

Declan half turned his head to see him. "I know if you wanted to, you could tell him to hate me as much as you do and he'd listen."

"I wouldn't do that," Ronan said, horrified.

"Please," Declan said. He'd never said that word honestly before. He sounded like a kid. He looked like a dog who'd been beaten. "He's the only one who ever loved me. He's the only family I have."

"I wouldn't do that," Ronan snarled. "I'm not _you_. I would never fucking do that."

His brother stared at him for a long time. _I don't lie_ , Ronan wanted to tell him, but Declan already knew. He nodded, then said, "I hate you, too, you know."

"I know," said Ronan. Declan had been hating Ronan since long before Ronan started hating him back. The Barns was starting to shiver. Something awful was pulling at him. He could taste blood in his mouth. "I'm fixing it, for Matthew. I think I found a way to keep him awake when something happens to me. I think it'll work."

Declan's eyes widened, even as a frown pulled at his mouth. "'When'?"

Ronan offered a sharp smile. "Met something that's a bigger bastard than I am."

"No shit," Declan said, mildly incredulous.

"Like you said, I'll die young." Ronan shrugged.

Declan let the silence stretch for a while before he said, "I'll take care of him."

He meant Matthew, not the bigger bastard. He was done fighting Ronan's battles. He left.

Ronan watched him go.

He slept.

He dreamt he was lying on the floor next to the bed in the little apartment above the St. Agnes church office. He dreamt of Adam Parrish.

"Is it really you?" Ronan asked him. Sunlight made the dust in the air shine. Adam was standing over him. He crouched down at Ronan's side.

"Not this time," he answered. "I'd be here if I could, though, to keep you out of trouble."

Ronan raised an eyebrow. "You've never kept me out of trouble, Parrish."

Adam shrugged. "Did I say keep you out of? I meant help you cause."

 _That'a boy_ , Ronan thought. Adam pressed his palm to the sutures on Ronan's chest. He filled in the raw hollow inside. Ronan breathed, "Adam." All the painful edges were softening. The metallic taste in his mouth was ebbing. Everything was going drippy and faded like watercolor.

Adam, still sharp, cracked a wry grin that made Ronan ache. "Time to go, cowboy."

"I don't want to," Ronan murmured. His eyelids felt weighted, but he fought the pull. He wanted to stay right here, just for a while, just until he recovered his strength. He hadn't known before that he had so much of it to lose. Adam touched his face.

"Ronan," he said. "It'll be okay."

Ronan let his eyes close, and woke up.

 

 

Gansey hadn't moved in almost seven hours, and jumped nearly a foot when Ronan bolted upright in Persephone's purple bed, but caught him around the shoulders with a reflex honed by experience. The last time Gansey had held him like this — chest to chest and cheek to cheek, Ronan trembling with grief or exhaustion or fear or all three — had been in the weeks following Niall Lynch's death, only in the middle of the night and never to be spoken about in the morning. Now the room was bathed in afternoon light. Ronan clutched at Gansey's back with bruising fingers.

Over his shoulder, Gansey watched Adam take a half-step toward them and visibly stop himself, frowning. He watched Blue do the same thing, afraid. He met both their gazes sternly in turn and then closed his eyes.

"You're all right," he told Ronan. He rubbed his palm up Ronan's sweaty back to grip the nape of his neck, felt Ronan's pulse rabbiting under his fingertips. "God, Ronan, you scared me."

"Gansey," Ronan said. His voice was less than a whisper, a breath right at Gansey's ear. He was, Gansey realized with honest shock, afraid. Gansey had been hoping Ronan would acquire a healthy sense of fear since he'd met him, but somehow doubted his wish had been granted. Whatever Ronan had experienced, they weren't ready for it.

"Can you tell me what happened?" Gansey said in the same near-silent voice. As an afterthought, he added, "We're not alone."

Ronan already knew that. He didn't pull away. This was for Gansey's ears only. "The mask...the third sleeper. It's awake."

Gansey inhaled sharply, masked it by turning his head so that his nose touched Ronan's face. His head was spinning. It had been so long since he'd slept. He made an effort to breathe normally, and held Ronan to him with a hand on the back of his head. Ronan hadn't shaved it since they'd left the cave. His hair was dark and thick and fuzzy against Gansey's hand. His stubble scraped Gansey's cheek uncomfortably. Gansey asked, "What did it do to you?"

Ronan's voice broke on the word, "Hurt."

Gansey clutched him a little tighter. "It's after you?"

There was a minute shake of Ronan's head. Gansey's heart was either in his feet or his throat. "Not me," Ronan said. "Parrish."

 

 

Later.

It was later. Ronan didn't know how much. Time had passed in strange flashes. He'd been punched in the arm, and then tightly hugged, and then punched again by Blue. He'd gotten into a shouting fight with Adam in the backyard of 300 Fox Way. Noah had disappeared. Ronan and Gansey had dropped Blue off at Nino's and Adam off at the trailer factory. Nothing unusual had happened but everything was different.

In the front seat of Gansey's suburban, Chainsaw clung to his shoulder, but wouldn't allow him to touch her. It was almost seven; the sun had already gone down. Less than twenty-four hours ago, Ronan hadn't even remembered that this world existed. He felt like he'd been turned inside out. 

Back at Monmouth, Gansey's hand clamped around his arm. He said, "Ronan." 

It was a little like a command. Ronan latched onto it gratefully. "Yeah."

He led Gansey into his bedroom. The floor was cluttered with things from his dreams. At the moment he couldn't bear to look at them, but he turned on the light anyway. The sight of the mask on the wall above his bed almost made him flinch. He didn't, but Gansey edged in front of him anyway, like he could protect him that way.

"This is it?" Gansey asked. Ronan gave him a condescending look which Gansey ignored. "You've been trying to destroy it."

Ronan didn't answer because it was obvious. The tire tracks, the scorch marks, the scarring from a sharp edge. "I didn't know what it was. Still fucking don't."

"You know what it's capable of," Gansey said. Ronan had a feeling it was capable of a lot more, but he didn't say that. Gansey had his determined face on. He looked at the mask sternly, as though he could shame it for what it had done. Maybe he could. Gansey was pretty capable himself.

Eventually, he turned to face Ronan again. "Don't tell Adam."

"You think, genius?" said Ronan. What did Gansey think they'd been fighting about? Adam was too unpredictable, and there was too much of a chance that he would march right into that darkness and let it swallow him, sacrifice himself to it the same way he had to Cabeswater. Asshole. "Blue, either."

Gansey frowned, but Ronan was right. Blue had enough on her shoulders. Gansey's mouth set in a firm line before he nodded. "Agreed. Just us." He pointed at Ronan. "We'll fix this."

He sounded certain, like he was making a promise. Promises could be broken. Ronan scoffed. "This isn't a bad grade, Gansey. We can't bribe our way out. It's hungry." Ronan had felt it. He could still feel the echo. That horrible, ravenous _want_ , to consume, to destroy, to darken, to take. Worse than any horror from his mind. He was afraid to close his eyes. He didn't think he'd ever sleep again. Not that it mattered. It had attacked him when he was awake. "We can't touch it."

"Lynch," Gansey said. His hand was on Ronan's shoulder. Ronan shrugged it off. His hands were shaking.

"It can get to him through me," he muttered. He wanted to shout, but didn't. He couldn't tear his eyes off the mask on his wall. "It'll use Adam. It'll kill him. There won't be anything left."

This thing wasn't Mr. Gray or Greenmantle. It couldn't be reasoned with and it couldn't be tricked. It wasn't misunderstood. It was fucking evil. Nothing they could threaten it with would be enough —

"We'll save him," Gansey said. "The favor."

— except, maybe, another sleeper.

Ronan pulled in a deep breath through his nostrils and let it out slowly through his teeth. He clenched his fists and nodded.

They'd fix Matthew. They'd find Glendower. They'd save Adam. 

Time was up.

 

 

Orla had been picking Blue up from work a lot lately. Blue thought she was probably trying to apologize, and didn't know how to tell her to stop, because it was just as much Blue's fault as hers whenever they fought. If it was lessening Orla's unnecessary guilt then Blue didn't want to take that away from her. She had graciously been suffering increasingly awkward five minute car rides for the last few weeks. It was a strange sort of torture.

In Blue's opinion, what they really needed to get back to normal was to have another fight. 

She'd thought this privately for a long time, but after the past few days, after whatever had happened with Ronan, she'd officially run out of patience. It seemed like a perfect opportunity to pick an argument that could escalate quickly when Orla ran a red light. There was no one else at the intersection, but it still pissed Blue off, and she was just opening her mouth to let Orla know it when a sleek yellow car pulled into view on the opposite side of the road.

"That's a Lamborghini," Orla said. She popped her gum in Blue's direction. "One of yours?"

Blue grit her teeth, trying hard to maintain politeness. "None of mine drive a Lamborghini. You know what all their cars look like."

Orla shrugged. "Raven boys swap cars out like toothbrushes."

She stopped at the next light, but the Lamborghini ran it in order to pull up next to them, facing the other way. Blue had to unbuckle and get to her knees in order to see the silver-haired man leaning out of the open window. He was exceptionally handsome. His green eyes reminded her of Gansey's — old and young at the same time. He spoke with a French accent. "Excuse me, could you point me in the direction of a hotel?"

True to form, Orla put on her flirtiest voice and made a performance of telling him. Blue had a feeling the man wasn't going to be impressed by the Holiday Inn next to the bait shop, no matter how like the Ritz-Carlton Orla made it sound. It was clear to her that this man, whoever he was, did not belong in Henrietta.

"Merci, mon chéri," the man said. Orla giggled. Blue felt like she'd grown enough as a person to admit, at least to herself, that if he'd been talking to her she probably would have been giggling too.

"Orla," said Orla. She went bright red when he took the hand she offered and kissed the knuckles. Blue had never seen her blush in her life. She sounded breathless. "My name, I mean. Orla Sargent."

"A pleasure to meet you, Orla Sargent," said the man. He looked past her to Blue, and his smile seemed to widen. "My name is Vincent Laumonier."

 

The End.

**Author's Note:**

> I can usually be found shouting enthusiastically over on [my TRC sideblog](http://essie-grant.tumblr.com).


End file.
